


amethyst and strawberries

by timelessidyll



Series: magic in our veins [3]
Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Don't worry they're coming, Fluff, Lee Jeno is Whipped, M/M, for dongyoung, hinted marksung and hyuckhei, literally nothing else to tag okay that's that
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-24
Updated: 2018-09-24
Packaged: 2019-07-16 06:17:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,349
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16080200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/timelessidyll/pseuds/timelessidyll
Summary: Jeno usually does a good job of handling the overwhelming emotions that come with a crowd of people. He's taught himself to block them out and refuse to soak in their emotions and auras, but he's not infallible. Sometimes, the emotions hang on for the ride and only hit him later.That's where Dongyoung steps in.





	amethyst and strawberries

**Author's Note:**

> this was written solely because the noyoung tag needs to be CLEANSED so here have some fluff  
> also strawberry swing is a good song thank you

To put it simply, Jeno's not really a people person. Not to say he hates people, because that's the opposite of his problem. He actually cares a little too much, Renjun would say. But with caring comes the cost of feelings, and with feelings comes the potential to be completely overwhelmed by the influx of emotions. So even though Jeno loves nothing more than helping and caring, he can't be around others for too long. It drives him insane, feeling everything everyone else feels all at once, and they don't even realize how much they're projecting themselves onto him.

 

Not that he'd tell them, obviously. But it would be nice for him if they could tone it down a little.

 

Most of the time, he's only close to feeling overwhelmed in school. Adolescent teenagers have no concept of handling their emotions constructively or productively, so he's always left with an emptiness in his soul at the end of the day. He tries not to internalize the emotions he experiences from others either, but sometimes the pain of a breakup sticks to him more than the exhilaration of a victory, and he has the spotty urges to break down and cry until the emotions pass. Like clouds covering the sun, Donghyuck says more often than not. It makes Jeno feel a little better on the worse days, so he hangs onto it.

 

Really bad days warrant a visit to the local ice cream parlor. Understandably, Renjun and Donghyuck are aware that Dongyoung is one of the only people who can help him rewrite his emotional state to be his own.

 

When Mark sees them walk in, he gives Jeno a sympathetic smile and nod. “Rough day?” he asks.

 

“A little.” Jeno sighs, not bothering with looking at the menu. He always gets the same thing anyway. “Strawberry with chocolate syrup and chocolate sticks.”

 

“You’ve been here enough times for me to be able to say your order in my sleep, Jeno,” Mark snorts, “and you never change it. Go sit down, I’ll call Dongyoung in for you. It’s his day off, though, so make yourself comfortable.” Mark turns his attention to Renjun and Donghyuck next and makes a disgruntled face. “And what’ll you two take?”

 

“Peanut butter, black licorice, and sprinkles,” Donghyuck answers casually, and Jeno mirrors Mark’s disgust.

 

“That’s the most disgusting combination you’ve thought of yet.” Mark shakes his head and adds the new order into the register.

 

“Mint chocolate chip,” Renjun chimes in, “with extra chip.”

 

“What does extra chip mean?” Mark asks, simultaneously incredulous and apprehensive.

 

“Hm, good question. I think I’ll take strawberry chips.”

 

Mark blinks. “What are strawberry chips?”

 

“You know, chips but strawberry flavored. You’re a wizard, you can do that.”

 

“I,” Mark begins, and then sighs. “Yeah, sure, I can do that.”

 

“Thanks, Markie-poo,” Donghyuck calls, skipping off to find a booth in the seating area and completely, blissfully ignoring Mark’s scowl. Renjun and Jeno watched him for a moment and then turned back to Mark.

 

“Sorry,” Jeno apologizes, although he’s not really sure what for. Mark waves him off, grabbing a cup and beginning to make their orders.

 

“It’s fine, Hyuck would’ve dragged you here even without your emotional state as an excuse. That’s more than what Jaemin does for me.” He sets the cup of strawberry ice cream on the counter for Jeno to take. “He just sends me a meme whenever I’m having an emotional crisis.”

 

“That’s because your emotional crisis is usually caused by Jisung and he’s tired of it,” Renjun deadpans, taking Donghyuck’s peanut butter ice cream and holding it as loosely as possible without it falling. “You weren’t lying, this looks disgusting.” Mark frowns when he looks at it again.

 

“It’s probably best if you ignore the existence of the sprinkles.” He takes a quick look around after saying that, checking to make sure none of the humans were looking at them, before murmuring a simple creation spell for small items. A small plastic cup of strawberry chips, as promised, appeared on the counter, and Mark swiftly pulls out a sprinkling of them to put on Renjun’s mint chocolate chip ice cream. “There you go. I’ll go call Dongyoung for you, Jeno.” Jeno smiles appreciatively and follows Renjun back to the seating area. Donghyuck already found a booth for the three of them against the wall, just as they like it.

 

He looks up from boredly making shapes on the table with sugar when he catches sight of the cup placed in front of him.

 

“It looks beautiful,” he declares, stabbing his spoon into it and taking a huge mouthful. Jeno winces even though he knows Donghyuck doesn’t get brain freeze. He and Renjun are more subdued taking their first few bites. He eats slowly, letting the strawberry ice cream melt in his mouth before swallowing. The coldness helps to numb the upset state of his stomach. The emotions he’d felt off of Tyler and Florence earlier during lunch had left him distant for the rest of the day, reeling from the intensity of their hatred and anger. He reaches into his pocket to touch the amethyst stone Dongyoung had given him, hoping that the gemstone’s properties would instill some peace in him.

 

“I’m bored. Wanna bet on when Mark will ask Jisung out?” Donghyuck asks conspiratorially after only a few bites of ice cream. Jeno huffs a laugh, fully aware of how quickly his friend switched thoughts.

 

“I bet you’ll finally ask Xuxi out before Mark even considers asking Jisung,” Renjun comments drily, and the implication of his words has Jeno laughing harder, nearly choking on his spoon. Donghyuck bristles and glares at Renjun, who doesn’t even look up from his cup, and Jeno can’t help but ease back into their light-hearted banter.

 

“Listen, Xuxi and I have a weird situation. I’m fae, he’s elf, and you know how much our families hate each other.”

 

“Oh yes, our modern Romeo and Juliet.” A buzz is heard from Renjun’s phone after his toneless rebuttal, and Jeno watches his face light up. “Gotta go, Chenle texted asking if I wanted to go watch To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before with him at his house.”

 

“It’s okay,” Jeno reassures, basking a little in the waves of happiness and affection Renjun was radiating.

 

“Yeah, we understand we’re only your side hoes,” Donghyuck pipes up. Renjun flicks his forehead as he gets up, pocketing his phone after answering Chenle and grabbing his empty cup.

 

“Jeno would be my only side hoe if I had any. I could live without you.” Donghyuck protests loudly to Renjun’s retreating, laughing figure, and Jeno thins his lips to prevent himself from laughing at Donghyuck’s expense. Donghyuck sighs and stabs his ice cream once again, angrily taking another bite of his imagined monstrosity.

 

“He never even used my plan,” he grumbled under his breath, although Jeno heard him just fine. As the happiness faded, he was back to feeling that hard pit in his stomach, those angry emotions that wouldn’t go away. He wished Dongyoung was already here.

 

As if by magic, Mark appears next to them, although Jeno knows who wouldn’t ever expose himself so easily as a wizard. He nudges Donghyuck to forcefully move inside the booth and ignores his dramatic complaints. He also has a chocolate milkshake in his hands, which Jeno knows doesn’t get sold at Ice Cream Magic. Dongyoung had thought the name was clever.

 

“Dongyoung told me he’ll be here in seven minutes.” Jeno checks the time. 3:49. At 3:56, Dongyoung would be here. Jeno can already feel his comforting presence, the remaining bits of his aura clinging to him and providing a feeling of contentment and home. He blinks the other two back into focus, unsurprised to see Donghyuck with his head on Mark’s shoulder.

 

“You were just pouting at him three seconds ago,” Jeno says with a raised eyebrow.

 

Donghyuck snorts. “Your point? His muscles are surprisingly soft. I bet this is what Xuxi’s feel like.”

 

“If you’re only keeping me around as a step-in for Xuxi, I think I want to cancel our friendship,” Mark says, narrowing his eyes at his best friend. Mark’s pseudo-hurt makes Donghyuck coo and pinch his face, resulting in yet another scowl directed his way.

 

“Don’t worry Markie-poo, you have your own advantages. You can make chocolate appear out of thin air. Xuxi has nothing on that.”

 

“Great, not only am I a pillow, I’m only here because of the food I bring. I think we’re done here, Hyuck.” Mark stands up with his empty milkshake cup, effectively shaking Donghyuck off his shoulder in the process. “I left Jungwoo manning the counter alone and it’s almost rush hour, so I gotta skedaddle.” Donghyuck recoils suddenly.

 

“I think I wanna end our friendship too. I can’t be around someone who says skedaddle.”

 

“Glad the feeling is mutual. Hope you feel better soon, Jeno!” Mark says as he walks back to the front. Jeno checks the time again. 3:54.

 

“Do you want me to stay with you until Dongyoung comes?”

 

“It’s okay, Hyuck, you probably have fae things to be doing.” Jeno likes to tease Donghyuck about the secrecy of the fae’s affairs more than he likes watermelon in the summer. Before Donghyuck can retaliate, he continues. “Besides it’s only two minutes. I’ll be fine.” Donghyuck shrugs, albeit reluctantly, and gets up to leave.

 

“If you say so, Jeno.” He touches the back of his hand, briefly, on his way out of the booth, but Jeno feels the serenity he’s giving him, and he smiles appreciatively.

 

“Thanks, Hyuck.” It’s 3:55. He’s not waiting long, staring at the melting puddle of strawberry ice cream mixing with chocolate syrup, before Dongyoung slips into the seat in front of him. He looks up blankly, too caught up in the whirl-storm of negativity he’d taken on throughout the day to be able to muster up a smile. Dongyoung’s eyebrows pinched together with concern and he reaches out a hand to cup Jeno’s cheek. He leans into the touch easily and lets his eyes close.

 

“What was it this time?” Dongyoung asks softly, rubbing a thumb along Jeno’s cheekbone.

 

“Tyler and Florence’s relationship is fracturing,” Jeno mumbles, “and they’re so mad at each other it hurts. There’s a lot of hurt anger and vengeful hatred and you know those emotions like to leech off of others the most.” ‘Especially him’ goes unsaid.

 

“You sound drained too. How long have you been dealing with the after effects.” Jeno doesn’t answer him, mostly because he’s trying to count for himself. “Baby?”

 

“About four hours now.” Dongyoung hisses sympathetically.

 

“Come on then.” Jeno sighs and gets up, feeling too heavy to be walking around so much. But he knows the faster he moves, the more quickly they could go back to Jeno’s house and cuddle to dispel the shadowy emotions clinging to him. He’s so tired that he nearly falls asleep in Dongyoung’s car as they drive back to his house and has to get shaken awake.

 

“Jeno, baby, you can’t sleep in my car. You’ll get the worst aches in your neck, believe me.”

 

“I forgot you’re a suffering college student,” Jeno says groggily, blinking away the blackness that stole across his vision. “God, I hate getting light-headed when I stand up.” Dongyoung laughs softly at him. He searches through his backpack for his house keys and lets them in, breathing in the smell of sage that filled the house. His mom was big on keeping a calm, undisturbed atmosphere in their house, but sometimes Jeno felt like that calmness was as fragile as a glass vase, inches away from shattering on the wooden floor.

 

“Couch or bedroom?”

 

“Bed. I just wanna sleep this off,” Jeno answers, taking his shoes off at the door and climbing up the stairs to the second level. Dongyoung follows him into his room, taking in the new posters on his wall and his rearranged desk. Jeno flops onto his bed and sighs, stuffing his head into his pillow. He hears Dongyoung’s breathy laughter to his right and feels the dip in his bed when he sits down.

 

“Lay down with me,” he says through the fabric, unsure if Dongyoung could even understand his muffled words. He gets lucky, because Dongyoung does exactly that, settling himself onto his side so that he’s facing Jeno. Jeno shifts himself so that he’s facing Dongyoung too and gives him a tired smile. “Sorry I’m so down today.”

 

“It’s okay, baby, you don’t have to apologize. You try too hard to be happy even when you’re dealing with everyone else’s emotions at the same time. It’s okay to have your off-days.” Dongyoung takes one of Jeno’s hands and links their fingers together. “I should get you a bracelet instead. Enhance the amethyst’s properties with a spell so that it does more to protect you.”

 

“They’re only emotions, Dongyoungie.”

 

“But they’re negative ones and they hurt you. It’s the least I can do to help you out a little.” Dongyoung pulls himself closer to press a kiss against Jeno’s forehead. “I know you’re strong, and you do really well in crowded places to keep your emotions separate from others. But you can’t fully prevent the remnants that stay with you from latching on.” Jeno doesn’t reply, focusing instead on playing with Dongyoung’s fingers and admiring their slenderness. He doesn’t exactly feel happier, but the pit in his stomach had loosened and the heaviness that the broken relationship brought with it was disappearing under the comfortable weight of Dongyoung’s love.

 

“Sing me a song?” he asks innocently, and Dongyoung melts under his gaze.

 

“Sure. Strawberry Swing?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

Jeno loves Dongyoung’s voice, loves the lilting, clear notes, loves how he seems to sink into the song. He loves, even more than that, the bliss that Dongyoung gives off without even realizing it. He lets himself fall asleep to the warmth that Dongyoung brings with him, his lovely singing, and a faint press of lips to his cheek.

**Author's Note:**

> [my twitter!](https://twitter.com/timelessidyll)   
>  [my curiouscat!](https://curiouscat.me/timelessidyll)


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